Dr Janice Bishop

United States of America

Dr. Janice Bishop is a chemist and planetary scientist who explores the planet Mars using spectroscopy. She attended Stanford University for a BS in Chemistry and MS in Earth Science in 1988, followed in 1994 by a PhD in Chemistry with a joint thesis project in Planetary Geology sponsored by a NASA Graduate Student Researchers Program Fellowship. She was awarded an Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship for a postdoc in Berlin at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and then a National Research Council Fellowship at NASA Ames in California. She has been a research scientist at the SETI Institute since 1999 and is currently Chair of Astrobiology and a member of the Science Council at the SETI Institute. Her investigations of CRISM spectral data from orbit at Mars are revealing clays and sulfates in the ancient rocks that provide information about the geochemical environment at the time the minerals formed. Dr. Bishop studies the spectral fingerprints of minerals and rocks in the lab for identification of these in the Martian data. Her research also involves collecting and studying Mars analog rocks and soils at a variety of locations including volcanic islands, cold deserts, hydrothermal regions, acidic aqueous sites, and meteorites which are the only Martian samples available on Earth to date.

Why are you are excited about participating in IMA2018?
IMA2018 will be a great opportunity to connect with mineralogists around the world. I’m looking forward to the conference and hearing the latest results from colleagues.

PRESENTATION TITLE: Using Mineralogy to Reveal Diverse Geochemical Environments and Climate on Mars